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No of course they can’t, but now that I have your attention I can waffle a little about what the Samurai Blue might be able to achieve in SA. We all remember fondly the days of summer 2002 and Japan advancing to the knock-outstages (though perhaps slightly overshadowed by S Korea’s remarkable advance to the semis). However with Japan going out with a whimper in Germany in 2006 and their warm up to SA 2010 consisting of 5 or 6 defeats on the trot one could be forgiven for thinking that Japan could be on course for the wooden spoon in Group E especially considering Holland, Denmark and Cameroon are all capable of beating Japan, and beating them well.
But who knows. As this blog is posted Japan have just taken a 1-0 lead against Cameroon, so perhaps the ‘spirit of 2002’ is in the air, and we can look forward to seeing Japan in the knockout stages – watch this space!